Protecting Our Girls: The Reality of Prostitution And Trafficking In Our Communities

Below is an excerpt of my guest post on one of my favorite blogs, Justice for All by Akhila Kolisetty. It's about the sexual exploitation of very young girls that happens in our country, often in our very own communities.
Did you know that the average age of entry into the commercial sex industry is 13 years old? I talk about this in more detail in the post. Please read and comment. Thanks!

Last week we heard the wonderful news of Sara Kruzan’s sentence commutation by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. For those unfamiliar with her story, Sara is a 33 year old woman who has spent half of her life in jail after being sentenced to life in prison for killing her pimp at the age of 16. A victim of child trafficking, Sara started being groomed for prostitution, or “the life”, at 11 and sexually exploited at 13.

Sara’s story, unfortunately, is not unique. Hundreds of thousands of young women under the age of 18 are sexually exploited in the United States. Some are runaways, some are victims of abuse, and some are victims of poverty. All of them, however, deserve protection.